I Need Discipline

4 Ways to Start Making Money From Your Blog

Posted: 10 Oct 2012 11:54 AM PDT

Blogging has spread all over the internet and many bloggers are making money off of the content that they share with their readers. Below are some of the most common ways of turning your blog into a way to generate some extra income.

Place Advertisements on Your Blog

One of the most popular ways of making money from blogging is to place advertisements for specific companies or products on the sidelines of your blog. Most advertisements function on a pay-per-click basis where, once you place an advertisement on your blog, you will earn a certain amount of money each time a person clicks on it. Companies hope that by advertising directly on blogs, they will reach a select target audience. For example, if you blog about great recipes, you might choose to place advertisements for companies that sell baking products or kitchen appliances. The audience that reads your blog will be more likely to click on one of these types of advertisements, rather than something unrelated.

Ask Viewers for Donations

Although some do not agree with the idea, if you put a lot of time and effort into your blog, it is not unreasonable to ask for donations from your readers. This is especially applicable if the information provided in your blog benefits your readers in some way that they will appreciate. In order to collect donation, you should ensure that your blog is consistently kept up to date and that you are providing your readers with unique and interesting content. A donation button can be set up on your page, directing your readers to a form where they can choose to make a donation via credit card, PayPal, or other method of payment.

Sell Products Within Your Blog

Although selling products directly from your blog seems like a good way to make commission on product sales, the folks at How to Start your Own Blog point out that in order to gain your readers’ trust, you must be unbiased. For example, if you are writing a photography blog and would like to recommend a camera to your readers, they may feel you are biased if you are also trying to sell a certain brand. Instead, consider linking to a website that sells multiple products so that your readers can trust that you are not influenced by a particular brand.

An alternative to simply selling products on you blog is to do a product test. For example, if you are considering linking to a certain brand of paint, blog about the paint and how it performed when you tested it out. Try to be as unbiased as possible and you will find that your readers will be more likely to click on the product link if they have seen the product in action.

Be Honest With Your Audience

Probably one of the most important aspects to blogging is the fact that bloggers tend to trust fellow internet bloggers rather than companies that are designed to push their own products. If you do choose to place advertisements on your blog, be upfront about your decision. Your readers will understand that you would like to generate some income from your efforts and will appreciate your transparency.

Although you should not expect to immediately generate a large income from blogging alone, making money from blogging is possible and relatively easy to begin. You will find that the amount of effort you put in to directing traffic to your blog and the quality of content you write about will be big determinants of how much you will get out of it.

BlogToProfit Go Bye Bye

Posted: 07 Oct 2012 11:16 AM PDT

Earlier this year I announced the sad news that Smorty had closed its doors, the way they suddenly shut down and disappeared during the night still leaves a bad taste in some people's mouths to this day and it looks like BlogToProfit have gone down the exact same road.

Personally I was paid for my work with them a long time ago and I never received regular work from them, when I added a new blog I would receive a couple of tasks straight away and then that would be it, but I have seen a couple of bloggers comment on their blogs that they are still owed money from them.

This was one of the sites where I made far more money with their referral scheme than I did writing for them ($10.00 per referral, yes please!).

The domain now directs to a site called The Blogging Institute (but keeps referring to itself as The Blog Profit Academy in the content) , who promise to show you secrets to making money online for a modest $19.95 a month. I'm not sure if this is run by the same people or if they sold the domain name to someone else.

This is another example of why it is important not to use just one network, I use as many as I can find and you will find them all listed on my Make Money page.

It is a shame when legit networks like this go down the plughole but scam networks like Blog Advertising Store continue to go from strength to strength.